Australian IT today posted a news article which you can read about here: Six areas picked to start broadband network. I think this is great news, the government has started preparing for the rollout of the Fibre to the Home network which will eventually deliver fast broadband to the majority of Australian homes using the faster and more modern Fiber Optic technology. This really came as a shock to me as I thought it would take a lot longer for them to start this but they are already in the process of releasing tenders to find people to supply and take on the project these tenders are set to close on August 5.

It seems like a bit of a public relations campaign to me but they have fast tracked the start of this project to areas that currently have very limited or no broadband access. On one hand this is what you would expect a government project to do – look after the people who are missing out because the big corporations don’t think it is fiscally plausible to do so. But on the other hand when they are rolling it out to electorates where the Government holds marginal seats you have to wonder what their motivation is.

Whatever their motivations are it is going ahead and that means that while it will be quite some time possibly years before they have completed the project and supplied this technology to the whole country. It is promising to see that it is starting and this will finally move Australia to be technologically on the same playing field as America and other countries that are already taking advantage of this kind of infrastructure.

I personally can’t wait to have this technology connected at our home and I don’t think the majority of Australian’s actually realise what this is going to mean to them. It is going to revolutionize the way we use the internet, giving us high speed internet access opens up so many possibilities. I think we will see a big shift in how we all consume our media, with traditional media such as television and newspapers playing less and less of a role. As we get access to larger amounts of internet bandwidth it will be more feasible to ‘legitimately’ watch movies, consume television programs that we want when we want and get music